Introduction Foundation

Alaska Software has developed XbToolsIII as a supplementary set of DLLs to be used in conjunction with the database development system Alaska Xbase++. The original intent for the development of XbToolsIII is to provide as much compatibility as possible to CA-Clipper programmers who use CA-Tools III for development under DOS and want to continue to use an extensive functional library for database programming with Xbase++.

XbToolsIII follows the idea of compatibility in a straightforward manner. It includes extensively used functions from CA-Tools III, for example string manipulation, mathematical functions or the famous tokenizer. Even the text mode window system and functions for Novell NetWare are reimplemented in XbToolsIII. However, not all functions of CA-Tools III could be made available in XbToolsIII. This is due to differences between the operating systems. Peek and Poke functions, for instance, or direct manipulation of the video memory is possible under DOS but is simply not allowed under 32-bit operating systems. Thus, in Alaska XbToolsIII all functions of CA-Tools III have been left out which contradict mechanisms of modern 32-bit operating systems.

On the other hand XbToolsIII includes functions supporting features which are handled differently or not available under DOS. Examples are functions for spooler management or serial communication. In most cases a programmer will not notice such differences since most of these functions can be used in the very same way as their DOS complement. Differences show up in a function's parameter profile where in some cases parameters are ignored or an additional parameter is supported.

Compared to CA-Tools III very few functions are new in the first release of XbToolsIII. This is reflected in the grouping of functions in the documentation which is the same in both products. Any programmer already familiar with CA-Tools III will feel comfortable with XbToolsIII immediately and will find the same functions in the same function group of the documentation.

The major difference in XbToolsIII is that the functions have been divided into different DLLs for simplified usage and to reduce workload. One contains all functions for Novell NetWare, the second contains NetBIOS related functions and the rest all none netware functions. How to install and use these XbToolsIII DLLs is subject of the following chapters.